Wednesday Mashup (4/24/13)

Trying to sneak in some items I couldn’t quite get to yesterday – this tells us the following:

RNC Chairman Reince Priebus blasted the Democratic National Committee for a new website that collects personal information as part of a “thank you note” to the first responders of last week’s Boston Marathon bombing.

In a tweet posted Monday afternoon, Priebus charges that Democrats are using the note to gather names and contact information for future fundraising asks (sic).

Can you smell the desperation from their side yet, people? They’ve been attacking Obama ever since January 21, 2009 in an effort to find ANYTHING that looks remotely like the legitimate scandal they would eternally cherish…and they’re coming up absolutely empty (or something that could be associated with him somehow, however tangentially in this case).

And accusing the Dems of trying to make money off of terrorism is particularly pathetic coming from the Repugs, seeing as how they have exploited TERRA! TERRA! TERRA! for fundraising purposes in Montana (here) and Minnesota (here)…they’ve probably done it all over this country, but those are the only specific locations I can find at the moment. And as noted here (from a Boston Herald story), a “GOP fundraising insider” was accused of transferring a not-insignificant amount of dough to a “terrorist camp” over six years ago…the story was met with a collective yawn by our bought-and-paid-for corporate media.

Actually, given the Repugs and their hatred of public sector employees (you know, people with “dumb” jobs like police, firefighters and teachers) and the fact that some of them acted in typically heroic fashion after the Boston Marathon attack, it wouldn’t surprise me to find out that the Obama folks are trying to set up a job bank for them in the event that some of them end up losing their jobs due to the “sequester” (in which Man Tan Boehner infamously claimed that he got 98 percent of what he wanted, let’s not forget).

Next, I give you the following from former Bushie Michael Gerson of the WaPo here (keeping with the bombing a bit)…

Over the past several decades, traditional forms of Islam have been challenged by radical variants, which often latch onto ethnic and tribal resentments. Disaffected, angry young men can be particularly receptive, causing turmoil in families, mosques, regions and countries.

In our country, such radicalism is rare — a tribute to America’s special superpower of assimilation…

It’s probably a “tribute,” once again, to the courageous men and women of law enforcement in this country (harking back a bit to the prior item).

I don’t draw a differentiation between radical Islamists and home-grown terrorists; they’re both, at heart, cowards who primarily want to frighten us into giving up our liberties. And unfortunately, they’ve been more successful than they should have been (and that comment is aimed at both of our major political parties, as well as the rest of us).

Gerson is waaay too cagey to admit this, but the plain fact is that, going back over the last 20 years at least, right-wing extremism has flourished while a Democrat has resided in An Oval Office as opposed to a Republican, as Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center points out here with statistics to back up that claim (the wretched economy isn’t helping one bit…and yes, I know there’s another reason why Obama is detested by organizations largely composed of racists – I don’t need to spell that out, do I?),

As Potok points out…

There were 149 of these (“Patriot” militia) groups in 2008, by our count. That number as of 2012 was 1,360. That’s 813% growth in four years.

The way to combat this is through calm vigilance, determination, and adherence to the rule of law (also, the next time one of these numbskulls claims that “Obama wants to take our guns,” we could try to patiently explain that, assuming that were even possible and he had a wish to do it, don’t you think he would have done it by now?). Besides, it’s not as if incidents of terror and bombings are exactly new to this country, as noted here (Rachel Maddow talked about this last night).

We’ll leave any notions of a “superpower of assimilation” (sounds like something out of DC/Action Comics) to Gerson and the equally clueless horde of Beltway bloviators (and on the subject of the Boston bombings, I thought this was interesting…also, the next time anyone is quick to blame Muslim extremism, it might be a good idea to read this).

Finally, I should note the departure of a true hero, and that would be Bob Edgar; this reminds us that he was a former U.S. House Representative, head of Common Cause, and a United Methodist minister.

It should also be pointed out that he definitely wasn’t a Democratic Party ideologue under any stretch of the imagination; as noted here, he once drew comparisons to the Vietnam and Iraq wars, and he was arrested here when he, along with a group of peaceful protestors, knelt and prayed in the Capitol Rotunda for increased social services funding (We can’t have that in the “age of austerity,” now can we? And more’s the pity that there wasn’t more of a religious presence from other denominations.).

As former head of Common Cause, Edgar once called out conservative lawyer James Bopp, Jr. for channeling millions of dollars into the 2010 midterm elections here (and we know how that turned out – last bullet). Also, here is a link to some of Edgar’s prior appearances on the Democracy Now! program.

When I think of people who have helped to inform my political opinion over the course of my life, I immediately think of individuals like Molly Ivins, David Sirota, Gene Lyons, Mark Shields, and precious few politicians, particularly of the present era. Bob Edgar is the utterly rare exception.

I can’t recall an individual whose convictions in his public and private life remained as steadfast as those of Bob Edgar. We as a nation and a people are better for his service; the challenge is now left up to us to fill the sizeable void created by his passing through our own selfless acts on behalf of the ever-growing numbers of our countrymen in need.

Tuesday Mashup (4/23/13)

I’m a little late I know with this item noting that Earth Day was yesterday (here), and with that in mind, here is a Media Matters post about related stories that are basically going untold by our corporate media (yes, I know they’re from last year, but I haven’t detected that things have changed much).

Also, on the subject of the environment, Think Progress brings us a pretty exhaustive list of the members of Congress belonging to the “climate zombie caucus” (many of whom continue to take up space on Capitol Hill), and this tells us that, according to the wingnuts, Earth Day is nothing but a communist plot anyway (never mind that that it became law under Republican President Richard Nixon). Also, this tells us about the sordid doings of “Doc” Hastings, chairman of the U.S. House Committee on Natural Resources.

Want to know why all of this matters? Well, for starters (as a Roman Catholic), I give you this.

Also, leave it to the Murdoch Street Journal to regurgitate any and all wingnut talking points, particularly on health care reform as noted here (and by the way, if the Democrats ever run a House committee again and link from that committee’s site to, say, an MSNBC story, I’m sure the wingnut harrumphing will be heard from the mountaintops)…

Congressional Republicans have mapped out another way to obstruct ObamaCare, thanks to the incompetence of its architects. It’s a shame certain absolutists on the right are mounting another self-defeating rebellion in the name of the impossible.

The insurrection comes as the Health and Human Services Department has already burned through all the dollars appropriated by the Affordable Care Act for implementation. HHS is now demanding an extra $5.9 billion to set up the law’s insurance exchanges—$2 billion more than it estimated it would take last year—but both Senate Democrats and the House denied the request last month.

HHS responded by announcing that it would simply steal however many dollars it needs from a separate ObamaCare slush fund. Supposedly devoted to “prevention,” this cash has been funneled to everything from bike-path signs to patronage for liberal pressure groups lobbying for fast-food taxes. Now HHS is reaching into this till for at least $454 million this year, with no accountability.

Yep, ridiculous is as ridiculous does – as noted here…

…the Affordable Care Act set aside $15 billion over 10 years to support prevention and preventive services through the Prevention and Public Health Fund—the largest commitment ever made by the U.S. government to prevent illness and injury before it occurs and keep people healthy in the first place.

Attacks on the prevention fund began almost as soon as it was passed. Some Republicans called it a “slush fund,” tried to kill it entirely and then to reduce its funding. Early this year, the fund was slashed to maintain unemployment benefits and avoid cutting pay to doctors in the Medicare program (the so-called “doc fix”).

Despite the hostility, in 2011, the CDC awarded nearly $300 million in Community Transformation Grants to states, cities and tribes across the country to create safe, walkable streets, promote healthy food environments, support worksite wellness, help children get after-school exercise and reduce people’s exposure to tobacco. One grant went to Oklahoma City, where Republican Mayor Mick Cornett has used the money to boost his efforts to make the city a healthier place.

Besides, as noted here, the Affordable Care Act incorporates the prevention recommendations from at least two separate pieces of legislation, one from former U.S. House Rep Mike Castle and one from U.S. Senator Mark Kirk.

And by the way, they’re both Republicans.

Continuing, this tells us the following (Update here)…

Travelers could be in for longer waits at the airport this week, after the Federal Aviation Administration imposed furloughs on air traffic controllers despite claims by some lawmakers that the agency could have complied with the sequester in other ways.

The FAA went ahead with the furloughs on Sunday, citing the automatic budget cuts that went into effect last month. Some delays appeared in the late evening in and around New York, and according to the FAA were spreading on Monday.

…

Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., said last week that the FAA “has made zero effort” to avoid the furloughs.

“The FAA’s decision is a dangerous political stunt that could jeopardize the safety and security of air travelers,” he said in a statement.

The FAA has estimated there could be flight delays of about 90 minutes during peak periods.

And if there’s someone who knows all about a “dangerous political stunt,” it’s Tom Coburn.

You see, Coburn has been obstructing on FAA funding for at least a year and a half, as noted here, to the point where former U.S. Repug Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison called him out, though not by name (Harry Reid came a little closer to that here).

And by the way, I’m tired of listening to Coburn whine about how dysfunctional Washington is. If he doesn’t like it there so much, then why doesn’t he just get the hell out? It’s not like he doesn’t have other options, right?

Further, just when you thought he was gone for good (here)…

Former President George W. Bush said he feels “no need to defend himself” over the high-profile decisions that marked his two terms in office, saying he will leave those judgments to history.

“There’s no need to defend myself,” Bush said in an interview with USA Today. “I did what I did and ultimately history will judge.”

Bush, along with President Obama and former Presidents Clinton, George H.W. Bush, and Carter, will be on hand to open the George W. Bush Presidential Center in Dallas on Thursday.

Here’s a news flash for Former President Highest Disapproval Rating In Gallup Poll History; half of those polled here from last November still blame him more than Number 44 for the still-perpetually-wretched economy. And this tells us that his approval rating has “skyrocketed” to 35 percent (only the previously mentioned Richard Milhous Nixon, who was faced with impeachment over Watergate that likely would have resulted in a conviction, is more unpopular, as noted here).

In a really twisted way I’ll admit, Dubya is actually the proverbial “gift that keeps on giving.” By continuing to remind us that he still enjoys the company of mostly decent people everywhere, he is a walking, talking, breathing example of Repug executive “governance” at its very worst, and a perpetual reminder of why his party should never be allowed to wield that degree of power ever again.

Update 4/25/13: Amen.

Finally, I should note that I’m really pissed off about this story, but not for the reason you may think.

If the kid wearing the T-shirt in question (14-year-old Jared Marcum) didn’t violate any school dress code, then he should have been left alone. Yes, many NRA members continue to gin up their outrage over their crass misinterpretation of the Second Amendment (which, thanks to Hangin’ Judge JR and the Supremes, now has the force of law courtesy of the Heller decision), but this is all we need…another wingnut pity party over being supposedly persecuted and harassed by those oh-so-dastardly liberals trying to take away our freedom!

I also know that teachers are allowed to make subjective judgments in these situations, and that should be respected too. However, now as a result of this, I’m sure we’ll also have some deep-pocketed pro-gun outfit filing a lawsuit to ensure that anyone on any grounds of any West Virginia school is allowed to carry a concealed weapon (besides, how about a calm, rational discussion with Marcum instead?).

You want all this nonsense to end, people? Elect Democrats and bug them to pass common sense gun laws. That way, maybe teachers will be less inclined to overreact.

And by the way, the story tells us that Logan County students wore NRA t-shirts today in solidarity with Marcum.

Heckuva job!

Wednesday Mashup (4/17/13)

• Someone named Wayne Allyn Root over at Fix Noise opined as follows here…
  

  There are no new jobs. There will be no new jobs. Creating jobs in Obama’s America is like trying to grow healthy plants in a nuclear blast zone. Obama has turned the U.S. economy into a “Hostile Work Environment.” I call it Obamageddon.

  And of course, there are zero citations for anything in this screed, which is totally typical from the media wing of the Republican Party.

  Yes, I’m sure there are smatterings of truth somewhere from Root (and at the very end of his column, he sneaks in a plug for his anti-Obama book, the latest from the right-wing outrage factory), such as payroll taxes going up (an expiration of the payroll tax cut not renewed by Congress, as noted here) and health insurance premiums going up (which has not one damn thing to do with “Obama Care,” since the exchanges aren’t due to go into effect until next year and the individual mandate, creating a whole bunch of new subscribers for the health insurance behemoths in this country, was upheld by The Supremes last year, as noted here).

  The inescapable fact is that the ultimate “power of the purse” in our government rests with the U.S. House, currently run by “Orange Man” Boehner and that sleazy weasel Eric Cantor, not Obama. And as noted here, Boehner couldn’t keep his own caucus together to get a deal even on his laughable “Plan B” on the economy, punting the decision back to Obama and the Senate, as Kevin Drum tells us (which ties back to Boehner’s practice of keeping our economy in perpetual crisis, which is bound to drag down job growth, as noted here). And as noted here, Boehner and his pals continue to sit on Obama’s American Jobs Act.

  And I’m tired of hearing about how “austerity” supposedly is the answer to our problems on the economy, including job growth (the latest debunking is here). And do you want to know where deficit reduction has come from so far? As noted here, 70 percent came from cuts in government programs, which are stimulative to one degree or another, and only 30 percent came from increased revenue (and for good measure, this omnibus post from Jon Perr of Daily Kos gives us all kinds of information on who does a better job of managing the economy between Democrats and Republicans).

  But of course this is typical for Root, who called Obama the “Marxist-in-chief” who has “declared war on capitalism” here (really?).

• Next, Thomas Sowell at clownhall.com tells us the following (here)…
  

  Amid all the heated, emotional advocacy of gun control, have you ever heard even one person present convincing hard evidence that tighter gun control laws have in fact reduced murders?

  Actually, yes. And here it is, from here…

  Last year, economist Richard Florida dove deep into the correlations between gun deaths and other kinds of social indicators. Some of what he found was, perhaps, unexpected: Higher populations, more stress, more immigrants, and more mental illness were not correlated with more deaths from gun violence. But one thing he found was, perhaps, perfectly predictable: States with tighter gun control laws appear to have fewer gun-related deaths. The disclaimer here is that correlation is not causation. But correlations can be suggestive:

  Also, here is more related info:

• This tells us that states with looser gun laws have higher rates of gun violence.
• This tells us that gun homicides in Missouri increased by 25 percent after the state repealed its background check law.
• This tells us that members of law enforcement are more likely to be killed in states with weaker gun laws (as I’ve said I don’t know how many times, why the #@!$ can’t we make the discussion about guns start from the point of view of what works best for the police? And yes, I know the answer.).


And by the way, I’m going to switch gears here, as it were, and add the following graphic concerning the trial of Philadelphia abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell (courtesy of Media Matters…I’m sick of reading and listening to wingnut caterwauling over a supposed “liberal bias” cover up on this truly horrific story, as noted here – truly sickening stuff, and Gosnell could quite rightly IMHO face the death penalty if convicted…more is here).

Update 4/18/13: If Marsha Blackburn is involved, then the stoo-pid is thick enough to cut with a knife (here).

From our area, Pancake Joe Pitts, Scott Garrett and Mike Kelly signed; go to Blackburn’s web site if you want to experience this idiocy first hand (the last thing I’m going to do is link to it myself – a good response is here).

• Continuing, it should be pointed out that, while one of Rupert Murdoch’s highest profile vanity rags is quite rightly getting excoriated for journalistic malpractice while reporting the horrific bombings at the Boston Marathon (here), it shouldn’t be forgotten that they also committed another affront to decency here…
  

  Fifty years ago (on 4/16), Martin Luther King Jr. penned one of the most enduring documents of the civil-rights struggle while locked in a jail cell in Birmingham, Ala.

  His Letter From Birmingham Jail was a clarion call for the right to civil disobedience. Though first requested by an editor for The New York Times, it was in the pages of The New York Post that these words would first be printed.

  This week, the Times published a very different kind of prison letter. Yesterday its op-ed pages carried an article titled “Gitmo Is Killing Me.” It was written by Samir Naji al Hasan Moqbel, whom the Times identifies only as “a prisoner at Guantanamo Bay since 2002.”

  …

  Pity the Times didn’t take a look at its own Web site before publishing. There, under a project called “The Guantanamo Docket,” is a Defense Department memo identifying the Yemeni national as “a member of al Qaeda who served on Osama bin Laden’s security detail.”

  The Post also points out that, as noted from here, Moqbel was indeed labeled as “A HIGH RISK . . . as he is likely to pose a threat to US interests.”

  However, when you read Page 3 of the 10-page “jacket” on Moqbel; you find out the following…

  Detainee traveled to Afghanistan, and stayed at a house in the Wazir Akbar Khan District of Kabul. Detainee left his passport at the house in Kabul before going to the frontlines to fight the Northern Alliance. He fought at the front lines north of Kabul as a fighter in the Sadiq Combat Unit, which consisted of approximately 15 or 16 fighters. Detainee received some pay as a fighter which enabled him to purchase needed items such as food and clothing. Detainee denied knowing (Osama bin Laden). After the US and Coalition bombing campaign initiated in Afghanistan, detainee believed it was too dangerous to be an Arab in Afghanistan; therefore, he fled the front-lines in December 2001 and stopped in Kabul. Detainee continued on to Khowst, AF, where he stayed for two weeks while he attempted to flee from Afghanistan.

  So basically, not only did Moqbel not fight against our troops, he was trying to get the hell out of Afghanistan after we invaded.

  And this guy is labeled “A HIGH RISK”? Am I missing something here? And as The Raw Story points out here, Moqbel was never even charged with a crime.

  Turning to Glenn Greenwald on this, we learn the following here (along with the fact that Moqbel is currently in the midst of a hunger strike to protest conditions in Guantanamo, which, when you learn more about it, is a national shame in and of itself, in particular the painful forced feedings endured by the inmates)…

  Moqbel…is Yemeni. More than half of the remaining 166 detainees at the camp are Yemeni. Dozens of those Yemenis (along with dozens of other detainees) have long ago been cleared for release by the US government on the ground that there is no evidence to believe they are a threat to anyone. A total of 87 of the remaining detainees – roughly half – have been cleared for release, of which 58 are Yemeni. Not even the US government at this point claims they are guilty or pose a threat to anyone.

  The Yemeni government not only is willing to take them, but is now demanding their release, using language notably harsh for a US puppet regime:

  “Even Yemen’s president, Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, who generally enjoys close relations with the United States, has directed rare criticism at the Obama administration.

  “‘We believe that keeping someone in prison for over 10 years without due process is clear-cut tyranny,’ Hadi said in a recent interview broadcast over the Arabic language channel of Russia Today. ‘The United States is fond of talking democracy and human rights. But when we were discussing the prisoner issue with the American attorney general, he had nothing to say.'”

  “Clear-cut tyranny”, says Yemen’s president. But in January, 2010, Obama – not Congress, but Obama – announced a moratorium on the release of any Yemeni detainees, even ones cleared for release. As Amnesty International put it at the beginning of this year:

  “But President Obama adopted the USA’s unilateral and flawed ‘global war’ paradigm and accepted indefinite detentions under this framework.

  “Then, in 2010, his administration announced that it had decided that four dozen of the Guantánamo detainees could neither be prosecuted nor released, but should remain in indefinite military detention without charge or criminal trial. The administration also imposed a moratorium on repatriation of Yemeni detainees. and said that 30 such detainees would be held in ‘conditional’ detention based on ‘current security conditions in Yemen’. This moratorium is still in place.”

  I realize that Obama tried to close Guantanamo, but received push-back from Congress (and Greenwald has some interesting commentary on that also from his post). However, the matter of either charging the Guantanamo prisoners or releasing them to their countries of origin (as much as that is feasible considering whether or not they can return) is worthy of something I once heard referred to as “the fierce urgency of now” as opposed to “the somewhat tepid need to address this matter by whoever follows in office sometime after 2016.”

• Finally, I should note from here that the Pulitzer Prizes in journalism were recently awarded; the New York Times won 4, including a team reporting award for some of the worker abuses at the Apple Foxconn facility in China. Others went to the Washington Post, the Sun-Sentinel in Fort Lauderdale, FLA, the Denver Post, and the Minneapolis Star Tribune.Oh, and Bret Stephens of the Murdoch Street Journal won an award for editorial writing.

  …

  OK, I’ll give you a minute to pick yourself up off the floor; no doubt that you experienced a convulsion of laughter over that last sentence that sent you falling out of your chair.

  There’s one problem, though – it’s true.

  Yes, really.

  As the story puts it…

  The Pulitzer citation said Stephens’ columns on American foreign policy and politics are incisive and “often enlivened by a contrarian twist.”

  Editorial Page Editor Paul Gigot said in a statement, “We’re delighted to see our colleague Bret Stephens recognized for his influential and popular columns on foreign affairs and politics.”

  So, in the spirit of the occasion, here are some examples of Stephens with his “contrarian twist” at work…

• Here, he lamented the supposed foreign policy failures of the Obama Administration, even though Number 44 had only been sworn into office a month ago.
• Here, he rather disgustingly compared John Lennon to the former Communist Party strongman who shared most of his last name.
• Here, he misrepresented the Bush Doctrine and criticized Obama for stepping up a bit on the Darfur crisis, as opposed to Former President Numbskull.
• Here, he defended “the surge” in Iraq and criticized Obama for not giving Dubya enough credit for it (typical wingnut mythology – any gains experienced as a result had to do more with the so-called “Sunni Awakening” and “Saint Petraeus” handing out bribes like cards from a deck of poker).
• Here, he criticized other countries for swine flu preparedness (that seems to be a particular sticking point for conservatives for some reason – guess they want unnecessary wholesale casualties to “decrease the surplus population,” as somebody once wrote).
• Stephens once wrote that “Consistency, principled or foolish, has never been a hobgoblin of the liberal mind.” in a column where he tried to equate the outing of covert U.S. agent Valerie Plame, who made a living tracking loose nukes before Bushco blew her cover, with Eric Holder’s investigation of interrogators who “threatened to kill the children and sexually assault the mother of a key terror suspect,” as noted here (some apples with your oranges, Bret?).
• Here (as K.O. tells us), he said that those who acknowledged the reality of global warming were “Stalinists” (and why the hell isn’t that man back on the air by now – Keith, I mean?).
• Here, Stephens decided to look into the future in an effort to try and imagine more scenarios of failure for President Obama.
• I cannot imagine what persuaded the committee awarding the Pulitzers into such an utterly laughable act as giving an award to this conservative hack (the fourth estate in this country continues to die a slow and inexorable death).

  
  If Bret Stephens can win a Pulitzer, then Dick Cheney can win the Nobel Peace Prize.

  Update 4/18/13: And as long as I’m discussing the Journal, I should point out that writer Peter Nicholas wrote this “news” story about Obama now choosing to lead, or whatever, in light of the fact that it took him three days to respond to the attempted Christmas plane bombing in 2009 by the guy who nearly blew up his junk instead. That appears to be accurate reporting, though.

  However, I don’t recall reading similar columns from the Journal about Obama’s wretched predecessor now choosing to lead or whatever after he waited six days to respond to the attemped plane attack by would-be show bomber Richard Reid, as noted here (see Myth 3).

  Lather, rinse, repeat…

  Update 4/22/13: And I somehow missed this earlier “gem” from Stephens.

  Update 4/14/17: Stephens recently won a gig as a columnist at The Old Gray Lady, where he no doubt will challenge BoBo as the leading white male practitioner of talking down to women, people of color and LGBTQ gender preferences – I think this is a good column to link to as a rejoinder of sorts (h/t Atrios).

Thursday Mashup (4/11/13) (updates)

I don’t really have much to say here, but credit where it’s due to PA-31 U.S. House Rep Steve Santarsiero for introducing legislation mandating universal background checks for gun purchases in our beloved commonwealth, specifically long guns purchased at private sales (the Inquirer story more or less leads us to believe that those were the only guns that were previously exempt; also, sales between family members without a background check would apparently still be allowed – not completely happy with that, but for the time being, I’ll settle for three-quarters of the proverbial loaf…kudos to Steve – to find out more, including a petition to regulate drilling in the Marcellus Shale, click here).

Also, I should note that Pat Toomey embodies just about everything I can’t stand in politics, and it remains an utter abomination that he defeated Joe Sestak in the campaign for Arlen Specter’s old seat in 2010. However, I would be remiss not to note his rather shocking cooperation with Dem Senator Joe Manchin on universal background checks (here) – I never thought I’d find myself giving Toomey credit for anything, but he deserves it here (though, of course, being a political animal, he knows the polling numbers on this issue, noted here and here, as well as anybody).

I will be curious to see how “No Corporate Tax” Pat ends up re-burnishing his wingnut bona fides to work himself back into the good graces of the “American Illiterati,” as John Fugelsang so hilariously puts it, as a result of his good conduct on this issue.

Update 1 4/16/13: So “We snookered the other side. They haven’t figured it out yet,” according to this insect named Alan Gottleib, huh (here)? Why am I not surprised?

So Toomey-Manchin makes it a federal crime to set up a national gun registry? Because the wingnuts continue to live under this delusion that Obama is coming for their guns?

Then ‘can the whole damn thing and try doing it right next time.

Update 2 4/16/13: Where Crazy Tom Coburn goes, trouble surely follows (here) – just sh*tcan the whole damn thing and start over…better to have no deal than a rotten one.

And sticking with the subject of guns for a moment, Rich Lowry inflicts the following here (and why exactly is “America’s Fish Wrap” giving this clown a megaphone…oh, right – it’s more corporate media “balance”)…

It is true that 90 percent of Americans support universal background checks. Who can be against background checks? Heck, even the NRA wants states to keep more complete records of who is forbidden from purchasing guns.

Notice the meely-mouthed wording from Lowry here? He could just say “Heck, even the NRA supports universal background checks.”

Of course, he doesn’t say that because he knows he would be utterly wrong (and as pointed out here, Lowry would still be wrong on the supposed issue of the NRA wanting to keep more complete records of who isn’t allowed to own a gun – how can states possibly do that when the NRA works as hard as they do to erode the gun laws we already have? And the linked story tells us once more that 90 percent of those polled, as well as 85 percent of NRA members, want universal background checks…and that includes Colorado, where James Holmes shot up his victims at the Aurora movie theater playing “The Dark Knight Rises,” as noted here).

And oh yeah, did you know that the NRA’s Wayne LaPierre supported universal background checks in 1999, as noted here?

Another thing…Lowry complains that President Obama supposedly “used children as props” in an effort to enact sane guns laws in this country.

Yeah, don’t you hate that?

Next, Alex Nowrasteh propagandized as follows as The Daily Tucker recently (here)…

H-1Bs are a bellwether for the economy. As growth picks up, so do filings for H-1B applications. As unemployment skyrockets, filings for H-1B applications plummet. The high demand for these visas this year is a good omen for the economy, and hopefully for immigration reform efforts as well. Highly skilled immigrants are generally considered the “sugar” in any immigration reform efforts — they are used to “sweeten” the other controversial elements like legalization.

After all, highly skilled immigrants tend to speak English, and there’s little fear of them abusing welfare or committing crimes. Their children typically excel at school , are economically successful, and are more culturally integrated than their parents.

Don’t you just love Nowrasteh’s disgusting inference that non H-1B workers are more likely to be “abusing welfare” and “committing crimes”?

Meanwhile, this Boston Globe story tells us the following…

ON JAN. 14, 2010, senior executives at Molina Healthcare in Long Beach, Calif., called their staff together for a somber meeting. The company had done poorly the previous quarter, they announced. Dozens of people in the IT department would have to be let go.

What the fired employees didn’t know was that the previous day, the US Department of Labor had approved applications for 40 temporary workers from India to be placed at Molina, through a company called Cognizant.

The fired employees — all US citizens or green card holders — were earning an average of $75,000 a year, plus benefits; the new workers, brought on H-1B visas, earned $50,000, with no benefits, according to a lawsuit filed by the ex-employees. The lawsuit alleges that Molina was flush with cash at the time, and that the real reason employees were fired was their nationality.

“The business model is to replace Americans,” said James Otto, their attorney.

Not just at Molina, he said. “It’s happening across the country.”

I’m not even sure why this is considered to be news any more by now, but if nothing else, it needs to be pointed out in response to the disgusting pabulum of Nowrasteh and others.

And in a similar vein, I give you this…

Brookings interviewed numerous corporations for that study. The report stirred up a storm with such statements as “employers have a difficult time recruiting residents with the skills they need, largely blaming the weak foundation of secondary education in the United States…employers complain that there is a shortage of skilled workers…[some employers] mentioned that they must recruit at over 50 college campuses in the United States to find 100 [science, technology, engineering, and mathematics] employees.”

#Gene Nelson of San Luis Obispo, a PhD in radiation biophysics and an opponent of H-1B, calls the Brookings study “pathetic baloney.” He and fellow anti-H-1B activists make a good case that the program is basically a scheme to lower the overall wage level in the engineering/computer profession, thus jacking up corporate profits and paving the way for absurdly high top-management pay.

And as noted in the video from here, an entire cottage industry has evolved of firms instructing potential employers how to run ads in order not to hire American workers and go the H-1B route instead (“gosh, well…you see, we just didn’t have a choice…all those baad American workers were busy collecting welfare and committing crimes…”).

It would be nice to see one of these corporate bastards convicted of some type of malfeasance over this stuff, then get put out of business with each member of the management team sentenced to 20 years of hard labor on a rock pile.

And let’s see now, Alex Nowrasteh, Alex Nowrasteh…why does that name sound familiar?

Oh yeah, I remember now! He’s the son of Cyrus Nowrasteh, the propagandizing tool behind that “Path to 9/11” monstrosity that was posted about here and here (the wingnut apple doesn’t rot far from the tree, now does it?).

(The late, great blog Outsourced America used to be all over this stuff – sigh.)

Continuing, it looks like we’ll have to deal with another crappy example of Repug non-governance (here)…

This week House Republicans will introduce the misleadingly titled “Working Families Flexibility Act of 2013.” Touted by Republicans as a new comp time initiative that will give hourly-paid workers the flexibility to meet family responsibilities, it is neither new nor about giving these workers much needed time off to care for their families. The bill rehashes legislation Republicans passed in the House in 1997, some 16 years ago, and that they introduced again in most subsequent Congresses. Its major effect would be to hamstring workers – likely increasing overtime hours for those who don’t want them and cutting pay for those who do.

Oh, but don’t you see? The Repugs are all about “choice.” As in, so-called “exempt” workers (who can’t collect overtime) have a choice now to work the hours denied to “non-exempt” employees who could collect the overtime before, but now cannot, since the exempt employees will do the work for them and the employers will pocket the difference in the way of bonuses for themselves. Witness our glorious free market enterprise system at work!

And what if the “non-exempt” employee wants the money instead of the hours, and/or the “exempt” employee chooses not to do more work for free?

Does this picture mean anything to any of us? Sure it does (especially after reading Alex Nowrasteh extolling the supposed virtues of H-1B workers, right?).

And by the way, I want to emphasize that I’m not criticizing the author of this Hill column, who is Eileen Appelbaum, Senior Economist, Center for Economic and Policy Research (kudos to her for this, actually).

So who is responsible for this latest legislative fraud? Why, that would be U.S. House Repug Martha Roby of Alabama (with the “blessing” of that sleazy weasel Eric Cantor, of course), as noted here.

And as also noted here, it looks like Roby is a tool (“tool-ette”?) of the banksters, and yes, she supported Paul Ryan’s budget big time (here), and here is more of that “get big gumint out of the private sector, because Freedom!” stuff from Roby and the rest of her ilk.

This latest bit of smoke and mirrors from the ruling clown show in the U.S. House will do nothing to address some of the iniquities faced by workers in this country as noted here (yes, I know the Forbes story is from November 2009, but based on my Google searching on this stuff, I haven’t found any improvements, sad to say).

Update 5/8/13: And it looks like Roby is at it again (here).

Further, Jake Tapper decided to placate the other side over the latest bit of faux indignation (here)…

On his CNN program Monday afternoon, Jake Tapper took a moment to look at the “buried lead” that is Fox News reporter Jana Winter facing jail time for refusing to out her confidential sources in a Colorado case. “Where is the public outrage?” Tapper asked his audience.

In July 2012, during a “huge scoop,” Winter cited anonymous law enforcement sources when reporting that Aurora, Colo., theater shooter James Holmes had once given his psychiatrist a notebook detailing his plans for a killing spree. Tapper wrote on his CNN blog that her reporting on the story revealed how “the system failed” the victims, and that her scoop allowed the “public to judge how well the judicial, and mental health, and other systems are working.”

“Instead of a focus on how the system failed, we’re talking about whether Winter should go to jail for reporting on Holmes’s journal, which was found in a mail room after the attack,” Tapper lamented.

And so, Tapper wanted to know, “where’s the public outrage?”

Please…

To begin, this stuff has been going on for years (as noted here), wrong as it is I’ll admit, but I didn’t hear anyone from Fix Noise or their fellow travelers complaining out loud when it involved the New York Times, the Washington Post, the AP, et cetera, et cetera.

However, as noted here (with the headline asking a very good question), “By acquiring the notebook, however, it was clear that Winter had been in contact with an individual who violated the gag order imposed on anyone with information about the ongoing Holmes trial.”

Here is my question – where is Winter’s editor in this fiasco? Does she even have one?

It should also be noted that, on the subject of reporters and leaking or withholding information, Tapper has no grounds to criticize anybody. As noted here and here, he misrepresented the position of our prior ruling cabal on the issue of firing anyone who had anything to do with leaking the identity of Valerie Plame; Tapper said that Bushco would only fire someone who had broken the law – Plame’s husband, diplomat Joe Wilson, pointed out that the administration’s former PR flak Scott McClellan said they would fire anyone involved in the leak whether they’d broken the law or not (and as you’ll recall, Karl Rove, just about named by Time reporter Matthew Cooper, was allowed to leave on his own terms).

I’ll admit that there’s room to question both the behavior of Winter and the judge here. However, you can’t go against a court ruling on revealing information that could be prejudicial to a trial (and by the way, you’d better believe that Holmes’s lawyers are concocting some way to try and get a potential guilty verdict overturned on grounds of a mistrial over this). And please spare me the wailing and gnashing of teeth…”oh, that baad mainstream media won’t cover this First Amendment catastrophe because it involves Fox.”

Finally, it’s time to turn to South Carolina U.S. Senator Huckleberry Graham (here).

As we know, President Obama submitted his budget to Congress, which included the horrendous formula known as “Chained C.P.I.” as part of calculating Social Security benefits (opposed by 2.3 million people, as noted here).

Of course, being a Repug, Graham just loves anything that sticks it to the “99 percent.” So how did he communicate what he thought of the budget?

“The president is showing a bit of leg here,” Graham said.

Now, if you’re of a certain age (and I am, which I’m a bit loathe to admit at times), one of the first images that comes into your mind when you hear that expression is that of actress Claudette Colbert in the movie “It Happened One Night” raising the hem of her dress to reveal a bit of leg, as it were, while trying to hitch hike, in an effort to get a car to slow down and look at her and offer a ride (the joke that works rather well in the movie is that her co-star Clark Gable first tried the more traditional means of sticking out his thumb, which obviously failed).

I don’t suppose that Graham knows this, though his handlers obviously do, including the Repug Party marketers and image makers who are compensated handsomely for trying to pull the proverbial wool over our eyes on a 24/7/365 basis.

My point (finally) is that, as opposed to saying, “We agree with some of what the president is proposing, but we want a closer look before we commit to anything” or similar language, Graham attempts to almost feminize Obama here, and thus, further trying to disrespect and delegitimize him (can you imagine the outcry if, say, Al Franken had said that about Dubya?).

After all, you can’t truly be a Repug unless you’re shamelessly demagoguing your enemies and accusing them of the same tactics you’re practicing yourself, can you?

Of course, Graham really doesn’t have any room to raise gender-bending talking points about anyone when you consider this…does he?

Friday Mashup (4/5/13)

This tells us that the crybabies were out in force recently (for anyone unfamiliar with the admittedly dated boomer reference in the pic, rest assured that it’s appropriate)…

The Bucks County commissioners should officially vote to assure all residents of its unwavering support of legal gun ownership in America.

That was the request put forward Wednesday by gun-rights advocates stirred up by a recent inquiry led by Commissioner Diane Marseglia.

During a retirement board meeting in March, Marseglia asked for and received support for a review of pension plan investments in companies that manufacture, distribute or sell guns.

No further action was taken by the board, though the move has sparked outrage from some gun owners.

Andrew Rumbold of Perkasie said Marseglia’s inquiry was only further evidence that “our constitutions, both federal and state, are coming under attack.”

Oh yes, how dare that baaad Dem Bucks Commissioner Diane Marseglia try to get the county out of the business of helping to subsidize the wholesale death and carnage industry.

And the outcry from the methane dispensers in attendance yielded the following reaction from Mr. “I Have A Semi-Open Mind” and his accomplice…

The commissioners quickly responded. During the meeting, Charley Martin put on his National Rifle Association ball cap. Rob Loughery spoke briefly about his 12-gauge shotgun.

And as they did so, the process of human evolution no doubt came to a standstill for an unspecified period (somewhere, Barney Fife is smiling as he forgets to load the bullet into his gun).

And speaking of Andrew Rumbold (pictured above), it should come as absolutely no surprise that he once ran for the PA Republican committee along with Simon Campbell and Jennifer Stefano (if it sounds like the Teahadists and reeks like the Teahadists…) but was apparently sued for his efforts by the three “endorsed” Repug committee candidates, George F. Komelasky, Joseph Cullen and “Skip” Goodnoe (here).

Nothing like a wingnut circular firing squad, is there?

And in other Bucks County political news, it looks like Mikey the Beloved has his first Dem challenger for 2014, and that would be Iraq and Afghanistan war veteran Kevin Strouse, as noted here (more info is here).

Next, this tells us the following (speaking of weaponry)…

“The U.S. has a system for controlling arms exports that, though too complex, is basically reasonable.”

According to HuffPo here, the “basically reasonable” U.S. exported about $66 billion in arms in 2011, while Russia, our nearest competition in that area, sold $4.8 billion.

This is tied into the following story as noted by Think Progress of an Arms Trade Treaty that was recently passed by the U.N., which, by all appearances, seems to have been necessitated by our cornering of that market all over the world (“We’re Number One! We’re Number One! U-S-A! U-S-A!”).

And keeping with the theme of world stuff, Claudia Rosett of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies recently opined as follows in the Murdoch Street Journal (here, about how Iran is trying to win favor throughout the U.N. – I’m sure there’s at least a kernel of truth here, but as far as I’m concerned, Israel should manage its own problems and leave us out of it)…

Unlike in the case of Iraq—where the 2003 toppling of Saddam Hussein exposed troves of financial records that helped explain how Baghdad persuaded the U.N. to ignore its own sanctions against Iraq—there is no access right now to Iran’s internal records. Perhaps with time, more will become clear.

In the matter of U.S. sanctions against Iraq, this from John Pilger of antiwar.com tells us the following…

In 1999, I traveled to Iraq with Denis Halliday, who had resigned as assistant secretary-general of the United Nations rather than enforce a punitive UN embargo on Iraq. Devised and policed by the United States and Britain, the extreme suffering caused by these “sanctions” included, according to Unicef, the deaths of half a million Iraqi children under the age of five.

Ten years later, in New York, I met the senior British official responsible for the imposition of sanctions. He is Carne Ross, once known in the UN as “Mr.Iraq.” I read to him a statement he made to a parliamentary select committee in 2007: “The weight of evidence clearly indicates that sanctions caused massive human suffering among ordinary Iraqis, particularly children. We, the US and UK governments, were the primary engineers and offenders of sanctions and were well aware of this evidence at the time but we largely ignored it or blamed it on the Saddam government. [We] effectively denied the entire population a means to live.”

I said, “That’s a shocking admission.”

“Yes, I agree,” he replied. “I feel very ashamed about it.”

So should we all (And nothing like creating a whole new generation of terrorists that we can arbitrarily decide to kill with our flying death robots, is there?).

Further (and returning to this country), this tells us of the consequences of PA’s illustrious governor Tom (“Space Cadet”) Corbett’s refusal to accept additional billions of dollars in Medicaid funds for our beloved commonwealth (though this does tie into the theme of victimizing those who can afford it the least…not much else to add here except maybe this).

Continuing, it looks like Dennis Miller has some competition in the “wingnut alleged comedian” category based on this…

Comedian Evan Sayet says he transformed from a self-described “brain-dead liberal” to a “9/13 Republican” because of his liberal friends’ failure to recognize the evil that motivated the terrorists who carried out the 9/11 attacks on America.

“What surprised me, what rocked my world, is what I metaphorically call 9/12. That’s the days, the weeks, the months and now the years after 9/11 and my liberal friends’ response to it,” Sayet told The Daily Caller’s Ginni Thomas.

“Here’s the most obvious case of good versus evil of my lifetime — perhaps the only case of good versus evil that hit anywhere close to home — and not only were the liberals on the side of the terrorists, but they were engaging in the most horrible slanders against the victims.”

Oh, and for good measure, “Political analyst Michael Barone says Sayet has ‘crossed the line from funny to important’” according to The Daily Tucker.

Yep, I would say that Sayet has crossed a line all right, but not in the way that he imagines (of course, he offers no proof whatsoever to back up his utterly scurrilous charges, and I for one have no desire to do the research on this that he should have done himself).

Also, this tells us that Sayet was to have been featured on the right-wing comedy network sponsored by Ed Snider, owner of the Philadelphia Flyers (as far as I’m concerned, the concept itself writes its own punch line…and yes, kudos to the team for playing better recently, but I can’t get excited about a possible first-round win and likely second-round loss in the playoffs, assuming they even make it).

We also learn from the Daily Caller post that Sayet is (or, at least, was) a fan of that dastardly liberal Bruce Springsteen, particularly in reference to songs by “The Boss” about cars.

This brings to mind the following lyric: “The highway’s jammed with broken heroes on a last-chance power drive” (I’ll admit, however, that it’s a stretch to consider Sayet to be a “hero” about anything).

Staying with Tucker Carlson’s Crayon Scribble Page, this tells us the following…

Convicted murderer Mumia Abu-Jamal has received three nominations on a web page for the “Unsung Hero” project from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).

The project, launched during Black History Month, allows users to highlight influential civil rights leaders in exchange for an email address and postal code.

The NAACP displays about 100 nominations, including the pro-Mumia nominations, on the website for its 2013 “Unsung Heroes” project, which asks the public for nominations, under the title, “Your Heroes.” Abu-Jamal, a former member of the Black Panther Party, was convicted for the December 1981 murder of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner, stemming from a shootout that resulted after Abu-Jamal approached Faulkner, who had pulled over Abu-Jamal’s younger brother at a traffic stop.

Of course, let’s forget shall we that the NAACP page has nominations of many other meritorious individuals as well as that of the convicted killer of Officer Faulkner (this reminds me of the urban legend of MoveOn.org supposedly awarding first prize to a commercial about an attempt to assassinate George W. Bush, or something). The post from The Daily Tucker also tells us that, as a test, this Patrick Howley person submitted a couple of bogus nominations but they were filtered, while the Mumia Abu-Jamal nominations weren’t.

I just have a couple of points in response:

1) Is Howley prepared to state, once and for all and on the record, that neither he nor anyone else at The Daily Tucker had anything to do with the three M A-J nominations?
2) Does this Howley person realize that he has done far more to publicize the cause for M A-J than any other left-wing site that I have yet seen? The post tells us about a “Free Mumia” rally in Philadelphia on April 24th and a new documentary about Jamal that has just been released.

The best thing to do about Mumia Abu-Jamal is ignore him and let him rot, especially since the question about capital punishment is no longer in play.

Finally, I have to tell you that I’m currently boiling mad at this guy, for the reasons noted here.

It’s not enough that, as noted here, his administration didn’t bother to investigate fraudulent lending practices as he said he would. Now, he’s putting proposals to cut Medicare and Social Security on the table in an effort to make Republicans (and by extension, the Beltway media-political complex) like him at long last (of course, Social Security doesn’t have a damn thing to do with the deficit or the debt, but this is where we are).

Congressional Republicans are truly lucky. They have at their disposal, between Obama in the White House and Harry Reid in the Senate, the most utterly feckless Democratic “opposition” on the federal level that I have ever seen.

Mr. President, you’re a smart man. Try to get this through your head. Follow through on these boneheaded ideas (which Congress probably won’t do anyway, since they apparently know the electoral calculus better than you do) and, at the very least, you will give over all branches of the federal government to the Republicans by 2016 by utterly and completely demoralizing your base to the point where they won’t turn out to the polls in the numbers that will be needed. And this country can’t survive another turn like that.

Try representing the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party for a change.

Update 1: And once more, the Obama Administration gives me grist to justify my griping (here).

And by the way, I want to emphasize something. It’s not just the fact that the supposed effort to investigate mortgage fraud was an utter sham. It’s not just the cave-in on what has been referred to as “chained CPI.” And it’s not just the administration’s opposition to contraception for women under 17.

It’s part of the whole bloody, stinking pattern of this administration to often (and usually on crucial issues) run against the needs and wishes of its base (and as I’ve said in the past, as much as I detested Dubya and our prior ruling cabal in the White House, they had a laser focus on the people who got them where they were and they acted accordingly, at least as long as Turd Blossom took up residence there also).

No, I don’t expect the Obama Administration to do everything I want. I couldn’t possibly expect that out of anyone in good conscience. But I DON’T expect them, nor should anyone expect them, to cater so slavishly to an opposition constituency that HAS ONLY HATED THEM IN THE PAST and WILL DO NOTHING BUT HATE THEM NOW AND FOR ALL TIME, and in the process, tie the proverbial millstone around the neck of the Democratic Party that it will have to carry through election cycles in the immediate and forseeable future.

Update 2: And oh yeah, remember the economy (here)?

Update 4/10/13: So let me guess…2.3 million people are wrong and you’re right (here)?